The Columbia County Commission approved the rezoning of land for a new cell tower, but not its requested height.

During their regular meeting Tuesday night, commissioners approved rezoning a plot of land at 5030 High Meadow Drive from residential and special to special to allow the construction of the tower to service areas of Columbia Road and William Few Parkway.

TowerCom, the Jacksonville-based company building the tower, also had requested a height variance so it could build a 195-foot tower on the site. Current Columbia County codes limit towers to 110 feet.

Congressman John Barrow, of Georgia’s 12th District, speaks to a group of seniors at the Bessie Thomas Community Center in Columbia County on Friday. Topics addressed during the sit down discussion included Medicare, partisan divisions, rules of a representative democracy, political theory and the role of the media in the political process.

Columbia County resident Heather Fearneyhough appears in the current issue of People magazine for being half the woman she used to be.

One of five weight loss success stories featured in an article about people who have lost 100 lbs. or more, Fearneyhough shed approximately 136 lbs. following the birth of her second child. She said at her heaviest, she was in a size 20.

Columbia County Community and Leisure Services Director Barry Smith knows it will be a long road before Columbia County gets its trail.

Envisioned as a bike-and-pedestrian-friendly route weaving its way from Grovetown to Riverside Park in Evans, roughly following the route of Euchee Creek, the trail as it might one day exist remains largely conceptual. But the pieces are in place to begin, including a decisive plan of where and how the trail will allow the public to interact with nature.

The Columbia County Commission doesn’t like the name “Georgia Regents University” either.

Commissioner Charles Allen proposed at this past week’s Management and Financial Services meeting that a debate item be added to the agenda of the Tuesday Columbia County Commission meeting, adopting a resolution to ask the University System of Georgia Board of Regents to reconsider the name chosen for the merged Georgia Health Sciences University and Augusta State University. Allen’s measure passed unanimously.

Although his beard and turban identify him as a Sikh, a member of the world’s fifth-largest religion, Dr. Harinderjit Singh is constantly confronted by people who don’t understand exactly what that means.

On Aug. 5, a gunman walked into a Sikh temple, or gurdwara, in Oak Creek, Wis. and opened fire. Six members of the temple were killed. Singh says when people understand the history and theology of the Sikh religion, there’s very little to hate.

Last week’s heavy rains had Harlem City Hall feeling a little under the weather and under water – twice.

Last Tuesday’s storm, which dumped more than 5 inches on Harlem, flooded City Hall and left the carpet wet throughout the building. When a second storm came through on Saturday, the building flooded again.

“This was nothing like we have had in the past,” said Harlem city manager Jason Rizner. “There has been a little water that seeped in during heavy rains, but nothing like this. But when you get that kind of rainfall, this is the kind of thing that will happen.”

A Columbia County resident was involved in a single car accident when she overturned in a drainage ditch at the corner of Fury’s Ferry and Hammond’s Ferry. Jim DiArenzo of the Columbia County Sheriff’s Department said Michelle Childer was traveling south on Fury’s Ferry when several cars in front of her stopped suddenly. Childers swerved to the right to avoid a collision, overturning her car in the ditch.